I am invariably of the politics of the people at whose table I sit, or beneath whose roof I sleep.

What experience and history teach is this—that nations and governments have never learned anything from history or acted upon any lessons they might have drawn from it.

Envy is the basis of democracy.

Written laws are like spiderwebs: they will catch, it is true, the weak and poor but would be torn in pieces by the rich and powerful.

It is a certain sign of a wise government and proceeding, when it can hold men’s hearts by hopes, when it cannot by satisfaction.

He may be a patriot for Austria, but the question is whether he is a patriot for me.

You have all the characteristics of a popular politician: a horrible voice, bad breeding, and a vulgar manner.

Natural rights is simple nonsense: natural and imprescriptible rights, rhetorical nonsense—nonsense upon stilts.

If you must take care that your opinions do not differ in the least from those of the person with whom you are talking, you might just as well be alone.

The poor have sometimes objected to being governed badly; the rich have always objected to being governed at all.

No free man shall be taken or imprisoned or dispossessed or outlawed or exiled, or in any way destroyed, nor will we go upon him, nor will we send against him except by the lawful judgment of his peers or by the law of the land.

An appeal to the reason of the people has never been known to fail in the long run.

In politics, what begins in fear usually ends in folly.